TGA Urges Congress to Include Strong GSP Renewal in Any Final Competitiveness Legislation
On May 3, TGA and TGA members joined with other industry groups and companies to urge Congress to include a long and robust extension of the Generalized System of Preferences (GSP) program in any final competitiveness/anti-China legislation approved by Congress. The House and Senate are moving to conference to reconcile differences between the House and Senate versions of the competitiveness/anti-China bill. The Senate-passed bill included a long-term extension of GSP (through 2027) with some new requirements. The House-passed bill includes only a short extension of GSP with numerous new requirements that would make it hard for almost any country to remain in the GSP program. Neither bill includes much needed fixes that would allow U.S. travel goods imports to grow under the program. GSP expired on January 1, 2021. When in place, GSP allows U.S. travel goods imports from most developing countries (NOT China or Vietnam) to enter the U.S. duty-free. Thanks to GSP, U.S. travel goods imports have been able to start to move away from China.